


bred soldiers

by oracular_vernacular



Series: warriors, thee and me [3]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Adventure, Angst, F/M, Feelings About the Star Wars: Clone Wars Finale, Fluff and Smut, Pre-Star Wars: Rebels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-29
Updated: 2020-07-05
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:08:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24978946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oracular_vernacular/pseuds/oracular_vernacular
Summary: Crushed in the aftermath of Order 66, Rex wanders the wastelands of the galaxy seeking purpose. His instincts seem to get him into trouble, now that they can no longer be deployed in battle.
Relationships: CT-7567 | Rex/Original Female Character(s)
Series: warriors, thee and me [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1798318
Comments: 2
Kudos: 29





	1. Chapter 1

Being dead is more interesting than Rex wants it to be, yet also not as interesting as he wishes it was. Every time he has to give a name, he makes a new one up. And he never can tell if it’s safe to show his face in public. He keeps to the most outer of the Outer Rim territories, or the most remote systems in any other part of the Galaxy that isn’t completely off the grid.

At first he wanders, hollow. His hands ache for something to do; he takes on shipping jobs, some less above board than others, but it drives him mad how predictable it all is. If he becomes a mercenary or a bounty hunter, he knows he’ll either give himself away or have to compromise his honor. And there’s no part of him willing to let go of being a soldier enough to do that. 

He thinks back far too often, but sometimes thoughts of Cut surface and he finds them strangely comforting. Farming in a quiet place, with a family. A simple life that requires harder work than just running crates from spaceport to spaceport, where something other than his ability to buy fuel and keep drifting is at stake. 

Perhaps it would still be too simple. He’s only been adrift for a few months, and the itch to fire a blaster never quite goes away. Plus, how’s he supposed to meet someone to settle down with out here, anyway? 

Jakku becomes a regular stop for supplies, though he can’t shake the hunch he has that they’re ill-gotten. But they’re cheap, and he doesn't mind roughing up the bishwags who sell him spit-shined bantha crap, either. Desert suits him better than lush planets; the harsh environment feels like a constant struggle, and that’s the closest the post-Republic galaxy can offer him to combat. And it’s less traveled than Tatooine, due to its lack of proximity to the Hutts. At least for the time being. 

Yet somehow, something off-color and intolerable seems to happen eventually everywhere he goes, and those itchy trigger fingers manage to get him in trouble. 

“Quiet, girl!” comes a snarl from outside-- a big snarl, and a screaming wail a little more muffled behind it. He’s at the bar, in a nondescript helmet and the least identifiable parts of his old armor. Eyes cut up to the back door, where the sounds are emanating from. The Rhodian he’s come here to meet notices, watches as Rex stands almost, but not quite, casually. 

“I wouldn’t,” the green one murmurs. Rex eyes him. “If Ulmar kills you, I have to find another runner.” 

“He won’t,” the clone growls low.

“Suit yourself.” 

Pretending to eye his comm idly, he wanders back towards the door. There’s a refresher on the way, which he only half ducks into. Hand on the blaster at his hip, he sidles up to the edge of the doorway like he’s back inside some Seppie ship encroaching on his enemy. 

“Hush, you little skug!” barks the voice of the huge Crolute-- Ulmar, the Rhodian called him. He’s got a little Twi’lek girl by the wrist, towing her away and towards some other hut in the distance, just outside the edge of the closest thing to a town this dirtball has. 

Rex decides to wing it. 

“Now, sir,” he says in a voice that’s strong, but conversational. “You’ll get nowhere scarin’ the girl like that.” 

Beady eyes set deep in a pink, fleshy face flash back at him. “Mind yer own business!” 

“I’m just trying to give you good advice--”

“I said sod off, spacer.” He’s stopped, but the girl is crying and trying to pull her hand away to no avail. “Unless you wanna have a scavenger’s burial today.” 

“You do know that slaving is illegal, right?” Rex asks; his hands fall to his sides as he just barely steps closer. 

"Who are you, a kriffing squealer? I don’t see no credentials on ya. Ain’t nobody enforces the law ‘round these parts.” He’s glaring now, planting his big leather-shod feet apart on the dry, cracked ground. The ex-trooper pulls his blaster quick as hell, and levels it between Ulmar’s eyes. 

“Let her go,” he orders. The Crolute’s face curls in disgust, and he taps a button on a device on his wrist. The sound of metal gears squalling rings from behind Rex. 

_Ah, kriff._

He spins, and what he sees shocks him to the bone. Two commando droids, evidently repurposed, head right for him from Maker knows where. They’re already firing; he rolls left and levies his own blasts back at them. Neither lands home, sputtering out against their chest plates and merely pausing their advance for a moment. He can still hear the Twi’lek child screaming, but it’s moving farther away. He veers off and towards Ulmar, who’s shuffling almost comically towards his destination. 

He ducks to avoid another two shots, fires back but still misses the eyes. _Get it together, Rex!_ Growling with frustration, he’s still trying to level his path back towards his objective while dodging shot after shot. Finally he lands one at the knee joint, and one of the clankers is down--

And still firing at him from the ground. There’s nothing, no cover unless he abandons Ulmar and the girl and heads back towards the building. A pub full of innocent bystanders. He groans and takes off at a sprint towards the screams he can still hear. Jumping the larger figure without a second thought, he drags Ulmar to the yellow dirt with him hoping the droids won’t fire while he’s so close to their boss. 

But they do. A blast grazes his arm and he shouts; his quarry grabs him by the other arm and flings him away with a roar. Rex, obstinate as ever, springs up and levels a shot right at the droid that sends sparks flying from its neck but doesn't stop it from standing or shooting. Just as he’s sure the thing’s about to take him out, something strange happens.

The crackling end of an electrostaff springs out of the clanker’s chest; it quakes in a series of electric shocks and falls over. Behind it, a figure wearing a gold and black helmet yanks their weapon back from its steel shell. He realizes that the other droid isn’t firing anymore either-- and that Ulmar is gone, the Twi’lek girl with him. 

“ _Haar'chak!_ ” he swears, shoving his blaster back in its holster and rubbing his forehead. 

“What were you trying, going after him alone like that?” comes a voice, garbled and unnaturally low pitched, from the helmet. He glances daggers back at the stranger; but it’s not his fault, Rex knows, so he just shakes his head and snarls faintly. 

“Was just following my guts.” _And it used to get me somewhere._

“I wouldn’t recommend that in the future, if your guts are unfamiliar with people like Ulmar.” 

“I’m getting more familiar with them, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t know what your quarrel is, but don’t underestimate him just because he sounds stupid.” The stranger turns off the electrostaff and sizes Rex up.

“My quarrel with him is he’s obviously taking children as slaves, for Maker knows what.” It’s still so easy to bark like he’s Captain, like whatever he says is the truth and whoever hears it will react just like his men used to. 

“Labor, mostly,” the man in the helmet replies. He seems unperturbed. 

“What are you, a bounty hunter?” 

“Of a sort. Come with me, if you’re so bothered by these things, and we can talk.” 

“Why?” Rex eyes the man up and down. He’s dressed in a strange mix of civvies and dirty plastoid armor. And well armed. 

But the helmet just gives him its blank stare, nods backwards towards the settlement. Then he turns and starts walking. 

The clone, with some reservation but evidently not enough to be hindered by it, follows him. 


	2. Chapter 2

It’s dark on the planet by the time the ramshackle crew of the  _ Haven _ is posted up in the nooks and crannies of a shipwreck. An old freighter, by the look of it, and a big one. It had to have landed nose-down dirtside days ago, but it’s already a shell. 

“Scavengers gutted it for parts,” growls a large Lasaat called Def from his post inside the shell. He’s loading up flash grenades into a launcher.

“Not surprising, on this desolate rock,” grumbles a human man, Ludo. “I wonder if someone’s selling the ion coil in the market still.” His eyes cut up to Shadow, which is apparently the name the helmeted man is giving. 

“You’ll get your part after this run,” comes from behind the vocoder. It’s cool, authoritative; the ‘now shut the fuck up’ at the end is implied. Rex peers over the lip of the shell through the scuffed transparisteel of a window that’s shattered higher up; there’s a cluster of stone and rock emerging from the sand below. 

“So this is a mine entrance?” he asks. “Doesn’t look like much.”

“Most of them don’t,” Shadow replies. “Bezorite and magnite only appear deeper in the crust, here. It’s expensive to mine, which is why slave labor is being used more and more.”

“Yeah, s’what happens when you’re this kriffing far out and there’s no major trade routes yet,” murmurs Def. “They’re workin' on one, though.”

“Who’s ‘they’?” comes a higher voice; Sarat, a female Zabrak with short horns all over her head.

“The Hutts, obviously,” Ludo replies.

“Oh, great. That means we’ll have to be here even more often,” she groans, checking her blaster. “I hate this lump.”

“You and me both, sister.” Def shakes his head, and latches the launcher together. “We’re good to go, boss.” 

“Just in time.” Shadow’s helmet cants out towards the rocks nearby; sure enough, a line of people chained together by their feet is being escorted through the sand by none other than Ulmar and two cronies, these ones apparently flesh and blood. “I have to thank you for your recklessness,” he adds to Rex. “It was a good excuse to take care of those droids he’s been keeping.”

“How’d he get ahold of them?” 

“Probably stole them from someone who stole them from an Imp,” Def shrugged. “Didn’t go to the source himself, though. Hasn’t got the balls.” 

“Silence.” Shadow’s order is followed instantly by his crew, and Rex can’t help but feel surprised that this collection of traditionally hot-headed species and a mouthy human all seem to follow his command. In the clone’s limited experience of the edge of the proverbial wheel, crews argue constantly with each other even when they have common goals. It grates on him, soldier that he’s always been, and dissuades him from taking on any crew of his own. 

One by one, the slaves disappear beneath the rocks. 

Slowly, the helmeted man’s gloved hand counts down from 5; on the final gesture, Def hauls the launcher up and proceeds to fire it over to the far side of the rocks. Ulmar and his men jump, and never have three figures made such a scramble. Def fires two more before Shadow calls out and the rest of them catapult out of their hiding place and descend on the slave owners like watumba bats. Except Ludo, who crouches high on the rocks with an Amban rifle. 

It’s a harder fight than Rex expects, even with a Lasaat and a Zabrak on his team. A whistle from on high means five more are coming from the land transport tucked away over the ridge; Ludo snipes one of them from afar and wounds another before his position is compromised and he scuttles down to join the fray. Rex ends up wrestling one of the men, and breaks his arm to relieve him of his blaster. Shots rain down, but Shadow manages to block a few of them with his electrostaff before vaulting it to land square in the chest of the largest guard.

Def calls down into the mine, and this is the part where Rex knows it’s gonna get messy. They plan to extract the slaves en masse. But the lift has no key in it. Shadow is toe to toe with Ulmar, but Crolute are not small and a wave of his arm sends the helmeted man flying. Before he has to think, his whole body alive and singing like it knows just what to do, Rex hauls Shadow back to his feet and points to the key hanging from his target’s neck. 

Two helmeted heads nod almost as one, and they split to come at Ulmar from both sides. Shadow leaps onto his shoulders, seizing his massive head by the jaw and yanking it back until they both topple over into the sand with a thunderous bellow. Rex pounces for the key, jerks it off by its chain, then pounces away again to pick off the guard who’s been giving Def a hard time and turn on the lift.

“Behind!” screams Sarat; just as the lift starts up, a hail of fire rains down on the lot of them from above where three more men have crept up the ridge.

“Shira,  _ now! _ ” barks Ludo into his comm; Shadow is busy yanking his staff out of one body so he can level it at another. “They’ve got more, we gotta go!” 

“C’mon lads!” shouts Def as the slaves, who are of a variety of species, genders, and ages, finally begin to file out of the inconspicuous opening of the mine shaft. Rex drops one of the cronies to the ground, looks over to see Shadow catch a blast to the shoulder and unleash a garbled scream from behind his vocoder as he spins and levels a blast right back. But the shooters above have cover, and his target drops before the blast can land home. 

“Shadow! We might need to fall back--” 

Before Rex can finish his sentence, massive blasts sear red trails in the night sky and blow the rocks behind the ridge into a flurry of debris that comes hailing down onto their attackers. 

“That’s it!” Def whoops, and then the racket of an approaching ship roars behind them. 

“Let’s go! We can kill these men another day,” Sarat calls as the slaves are herded into the  _ Haven’s _ open hatch where it hovers. 

And just like that, the crew is aboard and the speedy craft is jetting off towards the black. It’s not a big ship, so the dozen freshly liberated slaves are crowded into the cramped hangar on the floor as Ludo comes around with a jockey wrench to open their cuffs. Rex avoids their emphatic praise and thanks, uncertain what to do with it; luckily the crew seems practiced at this particular task. Instead, the clone makes his way up to the cockpit. 

“We know where most of these folks are going?” asks a voice from behind a vocoder; Shadow’s in the co-pilot’s seat, clutching his wounded arm. Beside him at the helm is a Wookie, who chortles. Another rowdy species to add to the collection of them that make up this crew.

“Only three rewards? That’s alright. We’ll be sure they get home. The rest I suppose we’ll have to talk to about where to go, or else they can remain at Lyrta Station.” 

“You do this for rewards?” Rex can’t help but ask, and distaste stains his words. The Wookie warbles at him indignantly.

“Shila’s right, only when there are rewards to be had. Sometimes there are none, but we take those jobs too. But we have to make coin once in a while, or we can’t afford to keep it up.” 

“Oh.”  _ Now you look like an asshole. There’s worse things to get paid for than rescuing enslaved people. _ “My apologies. I guess I’m gettin’ tired of the scum that seems to gather out in these sorts of places.” 

“I do not blame you, traveler,” Shadow says with a sigh. Again, Shila gives a rumbly noise. “She asks if you want us to bring you back to your ship now, or would you like to come see the station, perhaps refuel yourself and your supplies before we return you here?”

“I… should probably fly my own ship if I come to this station of yours.” A pang of concern washes over him at the idea of leaving his only meaningful source of income-- or freedom-- on a rock as desolate as Jakku. 

“It’s not a station on Imperial issue maps,” Shadow replies. “Or old Republic maps. And we do not give coordinates lightly.”

“Then I may have to skip this run, I’m afraid.” Sure, he wants to know about this place even more now, but there’s nothing practical about it. And he’s so calm, after a fight that good for the first time in what already feels like forever. 

“Of course,” is all the helmeted man says in response. “Shila, you heard our friend. Circle back to the landing yard.” The Wookie gives a brief little woof; Shadow nods and rises to his feet. “I must take care of this,” he adds, clutching his shoulder a little tighter. Rex nods and stands aside to let him through the exit, watching the stars careen by and the pallid orange surface of the planet swing into view. 


	3. Chapter 3

The smoking shell that greets Rex doesn’t just kill the high of combat, it brutally murders it and chucks it out the airlock for good measure. His entire kriffing ship is gone, and everything in it. Which to be fair, wasn’t much.

“ _Haven! Haven_ can you still hear me?” The comm is empty fuzz, and he wonders if they’ll pick up his signal or not. If he’s actually stranded here on this hunk of _dar’yaim_ at the buttfuck end of the galaxy. 

“You forget somethin’, spacer?” Finally, Ludo’s droll tones crackle to life over the receiver. 

“Nah, just my whole damn ship is on fire,” he growls. 

“Seriously? Kriffing hell.” 

“Yeah. You wanna take bets on who did it?” 

“Oh, I think we all got an idea. Alright, boss says we’re coming back to getcha. Hang tight.” 

“I’ll be out at the far end of the shipyard, in case someone’s waiting for me.” 

“Wise, brother.” With that, the comm’s dead. Being called _brother_ again, by someone who is not in fact his vod, sends an uncomfortable jolt through his spine. Rex sucks in a deep breath before turning to march out away from the settlement. 

By the time the _Haven_ touches back down, he’s surprised nobody’s pointed a blaster at him yet. Whoever Ulmar paid to toast his wings, they apparently didn’t get paid enough to stick around and make sure they toasted him along with it. 

“Didja miss me?” Def asks with a crooked grin as he watches Rex plod up the ramp once more.

“Yeah, loads.” 

“Knew it. Everyone does.” A chuckle. _The big cat’s got a decent sense of humor, at least._ “You might have to sleep here in the hangar if you get tired. It’s only about ten hours to Lyrta Station, but some of us passed out already.” 

“He can use my bunk if he’s tired,” comes a crackly voice. Shadow’s in the doorway with a fresh bandage on his shoulder. 

“Shad, you need to sleep,” Def intones. 

“I won’t sleep till these people are safe, and you know that.” 

“Fine,” the Lasaat growls, putting his clawed paw of a hand on top of the helmet for a moment before he slinks off to his bunk. 

“Thanks,” Rex says to Shadow, and he finds himself almost suspicious of such kindness despite the manner in which he’s spent his evening. 

“On one condition, though.” _Ah, there it is._ “Tell me your name, stranger. You know, so we know what to call you?”

Behind his helmet, the clone blinks a couple of times. This question catches him off guard every kriffing time. 

“Call me Blue.” 

“Blue?” 

“No more strange than Shadow,” he points out, and the grin’s in his voice. 

“Fair enough.” The other man nods, and turns down the hall. “This way.” 

Rex isn’t tired, but the ship’s so bloody crowded he takes shelter in the bunk offered anyway. He finally pulls his helmet off once he’s alone, and rubs his sleeve against the slightly sandy sweat on his brow. The bunk is sparse; a bed, a toilet that pulls out of the wall, a very few articles of clothing in the narrow slot of a closet. A cabinet along the wall; he knows it’s arms storage, but something curious comes over him and he tries the latch. He can tell a lot about a man by how many and what sort of blasters he has.

It’s locked, of course. Likely the Maker saving him from devolving into an ungrateful guest. He rubs his forehead and pauses for a moment, trying to think of how he’s going to get back to his life after this. Ignoring the little part of him that thinks maybe, just maybe, he should stay here. Help these people. Put his skills to some decent use.

But he’s not a soldier anymore, and pretending to be won’t help him. Neither will crusading for a cause, as he’s so painfully learned. So he climbs back onto the bed, props himself up. Wonders if Jedi would use times like this to meditate. _What does meditation mean, anyway? Can you even meditate if you don’t know shitall about the Force?_

Luckily for his weary mind, his body’s also weary, and he falls asleep long before he can figure it out. 


	4. Chapter 4

The hiss of the ship’s air-brakes and extending landing pads wakes him. Rex elects not to think about the fact that he’s been asleep for ten hours, apparently, as he dons his helmet again and ascends to the main level of the ship. 

As the hatch opens, the sound of rain overwhelms his ears. It’s absolutely pouring outside, and their rescues are wandering out into it towards what looks like an open-air market beneath a massive roof. 

"Come along, folks! Follow me! A little water won’t hurt ya, not here anyway. Rain’s one hundred percent acid-free!” calls Def in a singsong voice. 

“Refugee lodge is this way,” Ludo adds, striding out to the front of the little crowd and drawing them away. Sarat comes up beside Rex, putting her hand on her hip. 

“It’s _still_ kriffing raining,” she complains. “I’m built for dry heat. I hate this.” Behind her there’s a chummy bark as Shila makes her way up from the cockpit. 

“You’ll survive,” says Shadow as he follows his pilot into the hangar, his voice nearly a chuckle even from inside the helmet. 

“Yeah, we’ll see,” the Zabrak retorts, rolling her eyes and marching out into the rain to skitter towards the nearest shelter. Shila follows, giving the closest thing to a laugh Rex has ever heard coming out of a Wookie. 

“Did you sleep well?” Shadow asks before they descend the ramp and surrender to the absolute racket of rain on a helmet.

“Like the dead,” the clone replies. “Didn’t know I needed that.”

“I’m glad. Would you like to see the station?” 

“I’d like to find out where I can stay first, or else where I can buy another ship.”

“The salesyard is on the other side of the market. As for staying, the refugee lodge will welcome you, but you might ask the crew. Some of them have places here, for when they stay.”

“They all live here?” 

“Mostly, when they’re not in the black.” 

“And you?” Rex eyes the helmet, wondering. Of all the outlandish people he’s met since falling from the wreckage of the Old Republic, this character fit in the least. He kept waiting for it to surprise him in a bad way. 

“This ship is my home, but I have a hut here. It’s deeper in the woods, away from the station,” he replies. “I go there when I need to rest. It’s about half a day’s walk.” 

“Sounds lovely.” It isn’t quite the hut in the desert Rex has begun to ponder retiring to, but it does still appeal. His gloved hand fiddles with his utility belt a little awkwardly. “Listen, it’s your place, you can say no. But I’d like to see it. I think the walk might do me good. I can turn right around and walk back if it suits ya. I don’t have to stay.” _Maybe that walk will clear my head, so I can figure out where the hell to go after this._

He’s not expecting the easygoing laugh that emanates from Shadow’s helmet. 

“Alright, Blue. We can make that walk together. I had hoped to go there today anyway, so it works well for both of us. I’ll decide if you can shelter with me or not by the time we arrive.”

They start off under the blanket of rain, away from the station and the little shipyard onto a soggy road of gravel and packed earth. At first there are no trees, and the rain drills into Rex’s ears almost pleasantly. Shadow says nothing, but carries along beside him at an easy pace. Finally they come under some cover, and the rain is slightly less incessant. Even so, the quiet otherwise lasts quite a while as Rex does his best not to think, and just pays attention to what’s around him. Thinking sure isn’t getting him anywhere, anyway. 

“So, how’d you find this place?” he asks eventually, when his head feels calm. 

Shadow replies, but even though the rain isn’t as powerful under the spotty cover of the trees, he can’t make it out. 

“Sorry?” 

There are more noises this time, louder ones, but none of them make words. Instead of getting irritated, Rex just laughs. 

“Ah, kriff. These damn things aren’t helping anymore,” he chortles, and stops to grab either side of his helmet and tug it off. The rain is pleasantly cool on his face, and his head is as drenched as the rest of him in short order. He takes a breath, turning his face up to the sky for a moment. When he looks back, Shadow has gone deadly still. 

“You, uh, you alright?” he asks, suddenly nervous. _Shit, what if he knows? You fucking bolthead, you didn’t think--_

“...Rex?” 

_Kriff._

“Umm--”

“Is it really you?” 

“Listen, I don’t want any trouble...” 

Before he can finish, Shadow yanks off his helmet and chucks it bodily to the ground. First there’s a flash of sanguine hair, and then a pale face marked with red that Rex only sees in dreams that turn to nightmares.

“ _Aven?_ ” But once he’s uttered her name he’s struck absolutely dumb with shock. She stares back at him, a parade of emotions behind her pale eyes, stiff like she’s holding her breath. Time stops around him, and his heart bangs against his ribs. 

“I thought you were dead,” she says loudly over the rain, and almost… angrily?

“Well, that was sorta the idea.”

“You…” Her mouth works like she’s trying to speak but can’t find the words. “Did-- did you--”

“I didn’t kill any Jedi. _Ori'haat,_ ” he says quickly and in earnest, raising his hand. “I swear.” 

“But the clones, the _entire_ army--”

“I know. I know, but it was a chip they put in all the clones. They planned to control us from the start.”

“Rex,” she croaks, her chin trembling as she steps closer to him. “You’re _alive._ ” 

“So are you.” It’s a strange response, maybe, but it’s brimming with the shock of relief same as hers. So much shock that tears come unbidden, but if they’re falling he can’t tell. He can’t rip his eyes away from her, this ghost he’s already buried twice. The rain’s plastered her hair to her head, and she blinks drops from her eyes as she reaches up to take both sides of his face in her gloved hands. 

His helmet clatters to the muddy ground as he dives for her lips, fervent and shaken like he’s in a fever dream that could end at any moment. He wraps his hands around her waist, tugs her closer until their armor precludes any greater intimacy. The rain trickles into their mouths as they kiss, until their tongues begin to languish against one another. His hunger is so complete as it rises from the depths that Rex wants to take her right then and there, in the mud and the pouring rain, though he doesn’t. 

“ _Cyar’ika,_ ” he sighs against her mouth, hands trembling on her hips. “I never thought I’d see you again.”

“I’m sorry, _teleta,_ I’m so sorry--”

“Hush, please, hush. You did what you had to do.” 

“But it hurt you,” she murmurs, pressing her nose into his cheek. “Like it hurt me.”

“I’ve been hurt plenty before,” he almost laughs. 

“I could not help the other hurts.” Now she pulls away just enough to look into his eyes, fierce and unflinching. 

“You couldn't help that one either,” he murmured, running his nose along hers gingerly.

“I don’t deserve to have found you again.” The anguish in her voice pulls him back to take her chin in his big hand and tilt it up towards him. 

“It doesn’t matter what we deserve.” He says it with such intense authority, thinking back to the Venator-class ship falling apart around him, firing on his own vod, scooping Ahsoka out of the air only to land on what would become a graveyard for them all, even he and the Commander, though their deaths were only a cloak to protect them. “What matters is what we have. And I, by some aberration of the Maker’s grace, have you back, _cyar’ika._ Please,” and his pause is heavy, “please don’t tell me I have to lose you again.” 

At last there are tears in her eyes, tears she’s been fighting since she saw his face the last time, years ago. Slowly she shakes her head-- _no. I’m right here._

He smiles; a dam inside him somewhere has broken. 

“Then let’s get out of the rain, huh?” 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there's smut in this one, and it's cute too.

By the time they’ve started a fire in the little hut and hung their armor to dry, Rex’s hands want nothing but her skin. He peels her undershirt away, kissing his way down along her neck and red-tattooed chest until he finds one dark red nipple and draws a whimper out of her that’s music to his ears. 

When Aven paws at the hem of the black standard-issue bodyglove shirt he’s wearing, he wastes no time removing it. Their damp bodies press together in the firelight, the gray diffused day seeping in through the high windows. He traces every mark on her body, watching goosebumps form over her iridescent skin. When he reaches the marks that travel below her waistband, she tugs the leggings down, damp fabric rolling as it strains to release her lower half. Fives was right, after all. 

He’s taken her mouth again when he lays her down on the sleeping mat, electricity racing over his body as she runs her hands over the weary muscles of his back, shoulders-- and faster when she reaches his trousers, pulling at them. 

His cock springs out of the limmies underneath as he shucks both pieces of clothing at once, red and hard. But he waits, and pushes her legs apart instead. Between them her lips are the same red as her nipples, barely peeking out of the pale flesh of her mound.

“Can I touch you, _cyar’ika?_ ” After a moment where she seems confused, she nods in reply, and he can feel her heart beating faster where he strokes her neck. One hand slides down to open the folds, and she gasps when his fingers glide over a nub-- and then two more nubs?

Oh. _Oh._ There’s _three_ of them. 

“Ah! Rex--”

“You are so beautiful,” he breathes against her ear as his fingers triangulate a series of moans that shudder through her body like they have a pulse of their own. He’s never seen anyone so sensitive; when she starts to growl in a less-than-human way, it only excites him more.

“Rex--!” Her legs are shaking, hips starting to buck against him. 

“Please,” he groans, as though he’s begging her body to release. No sooner does he, but she starts to shake, back arching off the bed as a howl tears from her throat. He’s sucking in air, trying to temper his own excitement as she writhes against his hand and slowly collapses. 

“I-- I’ve never--”

“No one’s ever touched you before?” He can’t believe it. 

“Not _that_ much-- it’s so sensitive,” she pants. “They didn’t _need_ to.” He doesn’t wanna know if it’s just because there are three or if there had been some strange alien biology at work. All he knows is that he could watch her fall apart like that for hours. 

“Wait until I get my mouth on you,” he purrs, running fingers through the massive slick he’s made. 

She doesn’t have to wait very long. 

“Gods!” she mewls, digging into his short blonde fuzz with her nails. He has to track his head with her, her body moves so much in response to his tongue’s lazy laps and circles that eddy between the trifecta of clits in his mouth. She swears in her own language, words grating out of her strained throat until they break into another cry and she pins his head between her thighs. Her muscles shiver and seize; his cock leaks a pearl of precum and throbs with need. When she finally releases him, he drags his wet lips along her inner thigh to her knee. 

“ _Cyar’ika,_ ” he says as he gently slips a finger between her folds. “You-- you’re incredible.” She’s gasping beneath him as he strokes against the ripply texture of her lips, and he finds a band of tight muscle inside her cunt aways. When he slips past it to stroke her deep inner walls, it tightens in bursts. 

_Kriff, that’s gonna feel so good…_

“Rex, please,” she pants, reaching for his face. “ _Teleta_ , I’m hungry.” 

He’s not sure if it’s a mistranslation from her language to Basic or what, but that particular word shoots a powerful pang of lust through his abdomen and his dick twitches in response. 

“Maker,” he groans, leveling himself over her so he can press the delicate taste of her into her mouth with his tongue. He lines up his aching length with her entrance, guiding it with his hand until it sails home. 

With each moment as he sinks slowly into her, light and heat blossom from his core. It’s been long enough in general, but with Aven it feels like eternity. Half a lifetime, or something. Far too kriffing long, in any case. She takes his face in her hands, gasping until he’s in to the hilt. For a moment he pauses, and looks into her glassy eyes with his own. 

His hips start to shift, and then to snap; the friction is terrific, and his body is driving him towards release. He growls into her throat, burying his nose in her neck as he ruts. She’s pushing her hips up to meet him, tightening around him, a string of curses and moans and delicious, perfect sounds spilling from her. He’s almost dizzy with the grip of her inner muscles, pulsing, keeping him just on the edge until finally--

Stars explode from the back of his eyes and his thrusts mount to a frenzy; she yowls and clutches at his back with trembling hands. When he stutters and fails he collapses against her; letting her wrap all her quaking limbs around him like she’s afraid he’ll disappear. 

For a moment, everything feels alright. It’s the first time in his life, maybe. Like a lazy tide it laps the years of tension from his knotted muscles; he wanders away from thought and time in favor of Aven’s warm embrace. When he does finally move, he only drags his head away from her neck to stare into her pale eyes. Just as she ever has, she meets his gaze, steady and unafraid. He knows how achingly sweet these moments look from the outside, but it turns out that when you’re in them they’re something much bigger and more dumbfounding. Her thumb strokes his cheek. 

“Aven,” he says quietly, finally, “how did you end up…” _Out here captaining a ship full of feisty do-gooders?_

“Liberating what was left of my people brought me strange places,” she replies with a gentle smile.

“Did your travels ever take you back to Coruscant?” He feels almost embarrassed for a moment at the real question behind this one. 

“I thought of you every day.” Of course, somehow she knew. The readiness with which she answers his question strains his heart against its place inside his ribs. “But slavers stray from the core worlds, usually.”

“By the end I was almost never there anyway. The war got too big, too desperate.” Something hard lurks in his throat, though. He hasn’t spoken aloud about the end of it all since it happened. 

“You can tell me about it later,” she coos, pressing their foreheads together. A tear slides out of one of his eyes; he’s grateful for her understanding. Their tangle of limbs is the only comforting place he’s really been as long as he can remember. 

“Why don’t you tell me about you instead, _cyar’ika?_ ” he asks finally, breathing through the sorrow that’s taken up residence in his bones. She smiles.

“Will you tell me first what this word you always call me means?” Rex almost blushes, unable to stop the habitual urge to stow his feelings away somewhere he can forget about them as he has his whole life. 

“It’s Mando’a, the language of my template who was a Mandalorian. It means… beloved,” he murmurs. The way her eyes seem to glimmer from someplace far below their surface comforts him. He knows she remembers the first time he called her that-- it felt so foolish at the time. But he’d let the word that pushed at his lips slip out anyway, back then, because as far as he knew he would never see her again. “What about the word you keep calling me?” 

“ _Teleta?_ In the language of my people it means, ah, blade of my heart.” For the first time since he’s known her, she looks a little embarrassed herself. He can’t help but smile. 

“Blade of my heart?” 

“Yes. Or heart-blade, maybe. The blade with which my heart sings in battle, but also the blade that pricks me deepest when the battle is lost. It is also the name of our weapons, the golden knives you once saw.” _Her people truly were a warrior race,_ he thinks. “But to call a person this carries a much different… depth.” 

“And now neither of us is a soldier anymore,” he sighs.

“I still fight for something.” That fierce look he’s beginning to know is on her face again. The soldier he’s trying to bury stirs in him at this, but his doubt looms over it. 

“I was born to fight for something. At the end of it all, I can’t help but question if the Republic I defended was so worthy of my loyalty after all.” He glances away. 

“Would you not still fight _against_ something, Rex?” she asks. 

Wouldn’t he?

“You’re not fighting the Empire by bringing vigilante justice to the back end of the galaxy, you know. You’re fighting against slavery, but where does that take you in the end?” The question comes out more pointed than he intended. _What is the use of fighting against something when there’s no outcome more solid than all the innocents who slip through your fingers? No way to keep them from becoming slaves in the first place?_

“There have been… whispers of a rebellion,” she murmurs, as though she’s concerned someone may hear even though, for all intents and purposes, they may as well be alone in the galaxy. 

He doesn’t know how to feel about that. Not at all. 

“And you plan to join them?” 

“No, at least not until they are more than a whisper. Lyrta Station is my responsibility. No government protects it.” _How quickly she mantles the warrior queen again when something important is at stake. Not so different from you, eh?_ “You don’t have to stay, _teleta._ You don’t have to protect this place with me, nor take up my cause. I won’t demand that. But you’re more than welcome, if you want to.” 

Her eyes hold his with naked longing, and it melts the hard shell that’s come up to protect him since Order 66 was issued with near frightening speed. Out here in the wasteland, his involuntary home, what better use were his weary bones to be put to? 

Rex takes a moment to answer, and she looks down and away from him. In that moment, his resolve crystallizes. He reaches up a hand to tilt her by the chin back up towards him. 

“I’ll stay, _cyar’ika._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if i write another part of this story it's gonna be pure whump and why do i do this to Rex honestly he deserves better T-T
> 
> i might also write single ficlet chapters, set in between each of these parts, to kinda dot their timelines and dig into their characters similarities and differences and cameo some other characters from the canon. then again, i wonder sometimes if posting those at the end (or even reordering the parts of the series) is confusing or not...? 
> 
> anyway if you've read them all, thank you ^_^


End file.
